It was Monday morning. Mrs. Bond's little kitchen was full of the steam of boiling clothes. Little Charley, with one of Mrs. Bond's long calico aprons pinned over his frock, was pursuing on all fours his infantile investigations.

On the bench before the door stood two wash-tubs, at one of which stood a strapping Irish girl with red arms and petticoats, scrubbing the plowman's clothes with superhuman energy. At the other stood Rose, her curls knotted up on the back of her head, her sleeves rolled up above her round, white elbows, and her calico skirt pinned away from one of the prettiest ankles in the world; even this homespun attire could not disguise her beauty.

Three hours, by the old-fashioned clock in the corner, she had stood there; and yet, though she had rubbed the skin from her little hands, the pile of clothes before her seemed scarcely to have diminished, owing partly to her unskillfulness, and partly that she was obliged to leave off every few minutes to extricate Charley from some scrape with the shovel, tongs, or poker, or to barricade some door through which he seemed quite determined to go; added to this, her heart was very heavy, and one's fingers are apt to keep time with the heart pulses.

Oh, where was Vincent? Would he never return, as he had promised? Was he still "at his father's dying bed?" How strange she did not hear from him. How strange he had not told her where he was. He loved her? Oh, yes—"more than all the world beside." Had he not told her so? He could not have deserted her? Oh—no—no—and yet, poor Rose, there was such a weary pain at her heart; but see, there is Charley again, little mischief, between the andirons. Rose wipes the suds from her hands, and runs to extricate him for the twentieth time. She pats him petulantly; the boy does not cry, but he looks up at her with his father's eyes. Rose kisses those eyes; she dashes away her tears, and goes back again to her work. She tries to believe it will be all right. Mrs. Bond comes in to make the pudding for dinner. She sees how little progress Rose is making, and though Rose does her best to hide them, she sees the tell-tale tears, trembling on her long eyelashes.

Mrs. Bond has the best heart in the world; she never treads on the little ant-houses in the gravel walks, she says the robins have earned a right to the cherries by keeping the insects from the trees, she has turned veterinary surgeon to keep the breath of life in an old skeleton of a horse which Zedekiah "vowed oughter been shot long ago," she puts crumbs on the piazza for the ground birds, and is very careful to provide for the motherly yellow cat a soft bed. The peddler always is sure of a warm cup of tea, and the wooden-ware man of a bit of cheese or pie. Rose's tears make her quite miserable, so she says to Bridget, in her soft kind way, "I should think you might help wash the baby's clothes, Bridget."

"Not for the likes of her," retorted the vixen, with her red arms a-kimbo. "Thank the Virgin, I am an honest woman."

Rose snatched Charley from the floor and darted through the open door, with the fleetness of a deer; not weary now; strong to bear any thing, every thing but that coarse, cruel taunt. Away!—away from it! but where? Oh, Vincent, will it always follow! Strong, is she? Poor Rose! She falls earthward with her tender burden. Charley utters a cry of pain as his temples strike a sharp stone. Rose heeds not his cry, for she is insensible.

When her consciousness returns, some two hours after, she finds herself in her own little bed, with Mrs. Bond beside her. There are phials upon the table, and a strong smell of camphor; a bandage is around her forehead, and the blinds are closed, and Charley is not there, but she hears him crowing below stairs. Mrs. Bond puts her finger on her lip, and says, "Try to sleep, dear," and Rose gladly closes her eyes; she only wishes it were forever.